Minimize the risks of SAP S/4HANA Migration with Software Analytics

May 31, 2019 4:01:03 PM

Transform a difficult process into an opportunity to excel

The risk of migrating an IT system multiplies exponentially when it comes to the huge, complex legacy codebases present in many SAP systems today. Three out of four ERP transformation projects fail to stay on schedule or on budget. As they typically support mission-critical business processes, SAP systems contain a code legacy built up over many years by a variety of internal and external teams and constantly swell to a greater size. As a result, keeping an eye on these codebases at any given moment isn’t simple, let alone migrating to a different version like SAP S/4HANA safely, on-time and within-budget. Operating automatically, Seerene generates, consolidates and visualizes information from various SAP tools, generating real-time insights that support accurate, efficient decisions throughout the SAP S/4HANA migration process.

A swift and secure SAP S/4HANA migration

As teams plan and launch their SAP S/4HANA migration, they can suffer from a great lack of visibility over the entire software development process. At this stage, the inability to spot crucial errors or gauge their team’s workflow can lead to huge discrepancies in the planned strategy and a dissatisfactory result. The Seerene software analytics platform provides transparency across the SAP software systems, allowing for real-time reviewing and monitoring of status, risks and impediments.

Seerene helps companies understand how much functionality is spread across the whole implementation, with visualizations and analysis for code and coding activity that indicate the amount of work to be done. This data helps those planning the SAP S/4HANA Migration make informed decisions over whether to go Brown- or Green-field in their migration strategy, and the option to view the codebase according to specific time-ranges helps construct a migration plan that targets the appropriate areas in the code.

Acting promptly to reduce risk and increase revenue

Providing customers with incredibly fast in-memory calculation capacity for huge quantities of data, S/4HANA supports customer decision-making processes well beyond the platform technology currently available. Following a recent announcement made by SAP of the end-of-life for the current version in 2025, many customers begin planning their migrations in the interest of minimizing business risk. Others begin their migration process to benefit from the support offered by S/4HANA for artificial intelligence (AI) and its superior decision-making process. In order to capitalize on this potential, one of the largest software companies in the world uses Seerene to ensure that their migration to SAP S/4HANA happens punctually and as efficiently as possible.

Safeguard your SAP S/4HANA migration with Seerene

Connecting SAP systems to the Seerene analytics platform in a swift, seamless process eases and safeguards the process of planning migrations to SAP S/4HANA. Seerene gathers and analyses data daily from the SAP system landscape and SAP tools like the ABAP Test Cockpit (ATC), then providing a clear set of insights that it shares automatically with all stakeholders, from developers to those on a management level. All those involved with the migration benefit from instant access to actionable insights, project steering Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) and comprehensive software maps for detailed root-cause analysis. The Seerene platform allows you to identify, pinpoint and address issues across the entire length of a migration project, and beyond. As a non-invasive tool, it also excels for being able to analyze the entire codebase without extracting or altering a single unit.

Seerene supports all four phases of an SAP S/4HANA Migration project

Migrating an SAP system successfully means that those planning the migration should account for migration needs, execution plans, and the developer time and effort available at the given time. Software analytics support project managers, software architects, engineering managers, quality managers and release managers with every stage of the process.

1. Assess

As the main prerequisite for a customer completing their S/4HANA migration project plan, they must complete a thorough assessment of the existing SAP system landscape. Seerene assists with insights into code and development activities at this stage and gives readings that helps those organizing the migration ensure speed, focus and a low risk factor for the process. It offers the opportunity to make precise comparisons between different parts and exact calculations for risks, allowing for a foolproof strategy where the right skills are applied at the right times.

2. Plan

Once the priorities and timelines have been defined, Seerene helps to build a robust, operational project plan by helping to establish the amount of effort that will be needed to complete the task. The platform indicates trends in the codebase and gives the information needed for you to understand which areas in the codebase should be prioritized to ensure a smooth migration. Having established the nature of the work, Seerene also provides team-focused metrics like one for Effort spent in Complex Code, offering direction on the distribution of skills and support that should be offered to the project for the team to complete their objective.

3. Execute

As you proceed with the migration, Seerene crawls your system automatically on a daily basis and generates software maps for the current data. These maps spot needs for action, display areas where improvements have already been made, show possible delays and flag areas needing preventative action. Ensure that the code isn’t at risk of knowledge monopoly and check the levels of effort going into the migration, including effort in defect fixing. The graphic format offers a simple path to gaining full visibility over the migration’s status, progress and strategy, allowing those responsible for the project to monitor progress across all teams, identify impediments on an instant basis and complete the project efficiently.

Full transparency over project scope and activities helps identify the progress being made towards the goals, while challenges can be identified and addressed at an early stage thanks to Seerene’s automatic monitoring of the project(s). Ensure that delivery is of a high quality, that resources are applied effectively and provide reports for management with a few simple steps by sharing your findings with dashboards; it almost goes without saying that keeping the whole team on the same page is an essential part of completing difficult projects with a good result.

4. Adjust

Seerene allows you to spot project risks, impediments and root-causes at an early stage and makes it simple to track changes and activities to measure them against the planned impact. Plans can then be adjusted, all while ensuring that the team’s approach remains suitable for the set goals by reallocating resources appropriately in the event of any shifts in needs and time constraints. Understand the impact made by recent changes on the project scope, across all teams, and steer and review developers while being certain that these adjustments will deliver the desired results.

Seerene for SAP, beyond the S/4HANA migration process

The multifaceted benefits of software analytics for SAP go far beyond the migration process, with timely metrics that help a software development team deliver high quality code, punctually and safely. Use Seerene’s visibility and analytics to assess code to ensure an efficient release and compliance to quality standards, all while reducing rework by identifying the root cause and addressing issues promptly. Reduce costly modifications by locating changes and related requirements and help your product support customizations while avoiding an excess of modifications. Futureproof your SAP deployments by seeing all defects in the code that could have an impact in time to come, and steer and consolidate vendors by assessing and reviewing vendor performance, optimizing vendor contribution and delivery and performing data-driven vendor consolidation.

Due to the difficulty and oftentimes opaque nature of the task of migrating SAP systems to SAP S/4HANA, the idea that a single tool for software analytics might collapse this vast challenge into a series of digestible steps could feel as one to be easily dismissed as idealistic or as ‘too good to be true’. Indeed, Seerene is not to be treated as the final-destination that will perform every task involved in a migration: it is rather the wise, trusted informant that can describe and reveal any part of your codebase to you, allowing you to see and identify all that is to be done, to understand the nature of the tasks that need to be completed by your team. While not completing any coding for you, it is a crucial, enabling tool of precise code analysis, without which the task can feel near-impossible and with whose assistance the prospect of an SAP migration transforms into one that is full of potential.

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